Thursday, April 26, 2018

This is one of my favorite spots to enjoy tea outdoors near Pinglin, between Taipei and Ilan. The elevation is only 450 meters high, but it's completely surrounded by green subtropical forests and tea plantations. The tea I brew is my 2016 winter zhuo yan Wenshan Baozhong (it's the tea you get for free right now for any order of 200 USD or more).

This Baozhong is insect bitten, but far less oxidized as Oriental Beauty. The aromas are fruitier than a fresh Baozhong, and the taste has a kind of bitter-sweet astringency that lingers quietly in the palate. The color of the brew is golden, which is a great fit with my Chabu and my T-shirt! It's an interesting variation of the traditional Baozhong flavors. Actually, there's already a great diversity of Baozhongs that are made in northern Taiwan. Since this area is the cradle of Taiwan tea, there are more cultivars than in other tea regions. And all these cultivars can be processed as Wenshan Baozhong. That's why you'll find some little known cultivar names in my Baozhong selection (yingzhi hongxin, ying xiang). This diversity is one of the things that make Wenshan Baozhong interesting.

The twisted shape of the dry Baozhong leaves has an impact on how the tea is brewed. It's actually easier to brew than rolled Oolong, because it's easier to open up the leaves and get them to release their flavors. That's why it's suitable to use a porcelain gaiwan with Baozhong!

The other nice thing about Baozhong is that it comes from such a spectacular landscape!

These pictures make me think of the career of a Sung dynasty mandarin. During the first stage, the mandarin is fully devoted to the service of the emperor and, through him, the country. When he retires or is cast away, he often lives simply on a mountain where he reflects on his errors and what he could have done better! This kind of attitude shows a great strength of character. They'd accept complete responsibility for what happened to them! This shows how free they must have felt, even though they were following the instructions and wishes of their emperor. The only blame they'd cast was onto themselves!

This is also the spirit of the tea brewer when performing a Chaxi. First, he should make it with full devotion, fully involved in making it succeed, as if he were doing this in the service of a bigger power. Then if anything goes wrong, it's his fault and he should not blame anybody or anything else. Are the leaves of poor quality? It's his responsibility to find/purchase good ones. The water isn't warm enough? He should wait until it boils or add more fuel to his heater. The equipment is also his responsibility as well as every movement that he'll do to prepare the tea. Maybe he should train more often or select more suitable ware... We recall that mandarins were used to learn to write Chinese characters through endless repetitions...

The difference is that the mandarin worked rather selflessly for the glory of his emperor, while the tea brewer gets to fully enjoy every tea he makes!

Saturday, April 21, 2018

Wenshan Baozhong (aka pouchong) is a kind of Oolong that is made in the Wenshan area in northern Taiwan. The very first plantation was in the mountains of Nangang, east of Taipei in the late 19th century. But as the city grew, the tea fields have been pushed farther away to Shiding and Pinglin.

What few people don't know is that Baozhong isn't the name of a cultivar, but a way of wrapping the tea in a piece of paper. Baozhong can be made with most tea cultivars that are suitable for Oolong. That's because Wenshan Baozhong is a partially oxidized tea and therefore belongs to the Oolong tea category.
The production process starts with the harvest of the leaves. Here, we see a machine harvest, because it's more and more difficult to find pickers for this tea.

The leaves are packed in big bags made of white fabric and are brought to the tea factory for processing.

The withering of the leaves can happen outside, usually in the shade, or in such an indoors installation equipped with fans and gas heaters. The advantage of this indoor solution is that it can be used even when it rains, which can be quite useful in northern Taiwan, where short (or long) showers happen frequently.

The leaves are then placed on these bamboo mats on these racks and rest for the night. There's little tossing in this Baozhong process (which is why its oxidation is rather light).

The next day, the leaves are weighed so that each batch would have the same weight.

These 2 machines are going to be used first. A tumbling oven on the right and then a rolling and pressing machine.

Notice the broom on the right. The floor is carefully cleaned before the work starts.

The tumbling oven is heated below 300 degrees Celcius and the leaves are tossed inside when it's very hot.

This high temperature kill green process lasts between 6 and 7 minutes approximately. The maker feels the leaves to know when they are ready.

The oven is pivoted downwards and empties the hot leaves on a flexible bamboo mat.

The leaves are then quickly placed on this machine that rolls and bruises the leaves in order to release their juice.

This process also lasts several minutes.

The leaves become very wet and compact as a result.

They are loosened up by hand

until they are evenly distributed on a mat. Then, the rack is left to rest while the other leaves are similarly processed.

These are the next 2 machines that will be used. A drying machine on the left and a roaster on the right.

After all the leaves have been heated and rolled/bruised, they now need to be dried. It starts with this machine where you place the leaves on top.

My job here was to distribute the leaves evenly on the rolling carpet. A revolving steel fork makes sure that the stacks of leaves are not too thick.

After a couple of minutes, the leaves come out and a rolled by hand in a white cloth.

This drying process is repeated two more times, but now the leaves land on a bamboo mat directly (instead of the white cloth).

The leaves are evenly distributed on the mat and placed back on the racks.

When all the leaves have been processed comes the drying in the roaster.

I transfer the leaves from the bamboo mat to the metallic roasting plate. The thickness on each plate must be the same so that the leaves dry in an even fashion.

The temperature was set slightly above 70 degrees Celcius and the time at 3 hours. This temperature won't roast the leaves, but simply dry them thoroughly. There's just one more step that needs to be done: taking away the stems on the leaves by hand. This step is usually made by different workers and for this maker it rarely happens on the same day as the process. That's why it can last several days to get a finished Baozhong tea.

While these leaves are drying, a new batch of freshly harvested leaves have arrived and the whole process starts anew for the tea maker! I didn't want to wait for the leaves to dry and went to drink this subtropical forest Baozhong from spring 2017! I'll show you how my brewing went next time... This picture shows the typical shape of twisted leaves of Wenshan Baozhong:

Tuesday, April 17, 2018

The cycle of the seasons is a recurring theme in Chinese culture and paintings. Celebrating spring (east), summer (south), fall (west) and winter (north) is so universal and almost common that it can feel boring. Are you still with me or are you already bored by the subject?! Let's turn to Kuo Hsi (1000-1090) a famous Sung dynasty landscape painter to make spring more interesting. He reminds us that there are infinite numbers of distinctions within the spring season: morning or evening, early spring or late spring, sunny, cloudy or rainy, cold cool or warm, snow in spring, misty after rain... The change from one state to another can happen dramatically, within moments.

Take these 2 pictures from the San Hsia tea plantation where my BiLuoChun comes from, for instance. They were taken just 13 minutes apart! Sunshine and clouds change the colors, the warmth of the picture, which then conveys a different feeling. With these observations, we also come closer to the meaning of Northern Sung landscape paintings. It's the creation of mental images that express ideas and emotions.

New tea bush in San Hsia, northern Taiwan

The main idea behind most shan shui (mountain and water) paintings is the vastness of an orderly Universe in which man is almost insignificant, but lives an harmonious life with nature. (See this example: 'Early Spring' by Kuo Hsi and this video for more explanations). There are some recurring symbols that are important to know to understand landscape paintings, but the most important remains the state of mind, the feeling:
- the tallest mountain, often in the center, is a symbol for the State, the emperor. It dominates all other mountains,
- rocky mountains are like the bones of the earth. They are kernels of energy,
- smaller than the mountains, trees represent the enduring life. Pine trees are often symbols for the virtuous man in the wilderness,
- man is depicted smaller than trees and looks almost insignificant. He's sometimes on a path toward a temple in the mountain, which means a spiritual journey.

Today was cloudy, rainy and not a suitable day for harvesting tea. That's why I stayed home and felt like brewing a different kind of spring tea. Can you guess which tea I've chosen here above?

It's a spring 2005 BiLuoChun from Jiangsu! It's the highest quality there is: single buds harvested right before QingMing festival! (For green tea, the hand harvest is the most important cost factor: picking just 1 bud takes twice as much effort than picking 1 bud and 1 leaf at a time. And the earlier the tea is harvested in the season, the smaller are the buds and buds, which means the yield of a picker will be smallest for the same amount of work.

This Chaxi turns into a living landscape painting! It's just like what Kuo Hsi observed: "How delightful to enjoy a landscape painting rendered by a skillful hand! Without leaving one's home, to be transported to streams and ravines in faraway places, the cries of monkeys and birds faintly reaching one's ears, light dappling the hills, glittering reflections on the water dazzling the eye." Drinking tea is also a journey to where it came from.

The tea's taste adds another dimension that a painting doesn't have! In this case, the tea's light orange color is a good fit with the cloudy weather. The taste starts warmer and sweeter than a young green tea. But it has retained the same finesse and aftertaste. And what's amazing is that the freshness is still there, underneath or beyond the current dark flavors.

This cool river freshness comes from the brown open leaves, which is the theme of this Chabu! And like a northern Sung painting, my Chaxi tries to go beyond symbols. It reaches outward to recreate an harmonious nature. This then helps me, the brewer, to reach inward to master the mind and then satisfy my thirst!